Technology can be overstimulating, data can be oversensitive, and the internet can be overwhelming. The immersive nature of digital technologies can be seen throughout society and by how much our lives revolve around ‘platforms’, ‘devices’, media and our online presence. Ronnie Danaher’s practice explores how her experiences of growing up surrounded by technology and the internet have shaped her worldview and her relationship with religion, and have created space for different identities and communities around her.
I met with Ronnie in her studio in April 2024 to discuss her practice and reflect on the recurring themes in her work. Following our IRL conversation, which took many divergent turns, we continued our interview through digital communications, adding yet more data to our ever-growing digital vapour trails…
Purgatory is a recurring subject in Danaher’s projects and links to her past works which look for absolution and penance, such as in ‘iConfess’ (2022) and ‘Dataism Confessional’ (2021). Danaher expands on how the idea of purgatory has influenced her practice and discusses how the theme became an important part of her work.
‘Purgatory came up when reading Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto by Legacy Russell (Verso) while on residency in Milan with BJCEM and UK New Artists at Fabbrica del Vapore. Russell talks about the artist called American Artist, and about how googling “American artist” puts their website as the top result, with no mention of their legal name, placing them in “a sort of spatial limbo, a viral everywhere and nowhere”. Reading this felt like a “Wham Line”, which both radically altered the direction of my research but also cemented what I’d always been thinking about. As I come from a Catholic background, I’m always alert to religious references which cross over with the internet, and the significance of liminality and the in-between in my work made limbo my new obsession.’
Exploring purgatory as a ubiquitous place of nowhere, or as a journey, Danaher looks at her recent film work ‘If you jump on a moving party tram, where do you land?’ (2024), which considers the idea of the party tram as a type of queer purgatory.
‘The Milan residency space where I made “Party Tram” was next to a graveyard called Monumental Cemetery, which has hundreds of mausoleums, one of which was shaped like the Tower of Babel. A similar shape came up in my research of Dante’s Purgatorio, which described purgatory as a cone-shaped mountain where you had to make a treacherous journey up to reach heaven. I’m convinced we’re all in purgatory now. I read a trashy listicle about “signs you’re in purgatory”; the list included having difficulty making decisions, everything feeling like punishment, and not being able to get a tan. It also mentioned seeing fog and glitches everywhere. The glitch kept coming up in both my work and reading – so this cyclical nature of my research felt like its own purgatory.’
Pursuing the idea of ‘purgatory as journey’ further, Danaher considers the relationship of data and tech to the concept of queer purgatory.
‘The endless scroll can be considered a journey through the internet, and specifically on social media feeds. In terms of queerness, this endless scroll is more like a tunnel you dig and dig until you end up in the cosy bubble of a queer echo chamber. But this bubble is pierced in the comments section, the present-day internet forum where users ruthlessly tear each other to shreds. I always read the comments with both bemusement and dread as they spiral into irresolvable vitriol. Perhaps the eternal scroll is heaven and doomscrolling the comments is purgatory.’
Moving through purgatory with endless doomscrolling we are interrupted by ‘the glitch’. A glitch is supposedly a malfunction, an error that has distorted or interrupted; however, in glitch feminism it provides an opportunity to transform and create new identities. Danaher introduces how ‘the glitch’ has influenced her practice.
‘In Glitch Feminism, Russell writes that “gender is so big, it becomes invisible”, so ingrained in the way we live, that to rebel against it, or “to become an error is to surrender to becoming unknown, unrecognizable, unnamed”. So refusing to fit into an easily definable category is a liberation, a celebration of slipping through the cracks. What struck me with “the glitch” was its status or non-status as in-between, neither one thing nor the other. This rejection of classification at a time when identity traits are something that can be neatly packaged up and checked off was something I wanted to explore.’
‘The glitch’ considers the socio-technical construct of gender and sexuality and is non-conforming. Danaher deconstructs this idea and introduces the research that will be taking place during an upcoming residency in late May 2024.
“The glitch” is both non-conforming and non-performing, so it takes away this element of performing gender and refuses to do so. I’ll be on residency at Dos Mares (Marseille) in May and I’m planning on digging deeper. I’m experimenting with Blender and setting things on fire (digitally), like the purifying fires of purgatory, so I’ll be having fun cleansing my sinful creations with that, or just enjoying the glitches. I loved the conversation we had in person about life and death online and the idea of a graveyard for corrupted files, where they’re not deleted forever but not functioning either, like “the glitch” has dumped them in purgatory where they wait to be fixed or ditched.’
‘The glitch’ as sabotage is both something unintentional and also very definitely intentional. Danaher expands on the idea of self-constructing and sabotaging in her works.
‘I’ve been thinking about “the glitch” as this failure to conform within the binaries of society, as a queer or othered person, and choosing instead to revel in the state of boundless limbo. This maps onto my relationship with Catholicism. Calling yourself a ‘lapsed’ catholic is also like you’re a kind of glitch or failure within that religion, especially when you bring in its rejection of queer people historically. Yet the way Catholicism is ingrained throughout childhood means you’re not completely rid of it either. So you have to self-construct beyond this, but as we’ve seen online recently (or maybe it’s just me in my echo chamber), the wave of Catholic or religious meme pages that sit somewhere between earnestness and silliness show a generation of people that maybe aren’t ready to reject that part of their identity whilst being aware of the negative aspects of it. There’s something about finding joy or humour in that shared worldwide community of rejects and agnostics that keeps me coming back to it.’
Delving further into identity, the possibility of prototyping alternative identities is suggested. Danaher discusses how alternative identities play into her practice and where this might take her work in the future.
‘It comes back to thinking about using AFK (away from keyboard) rather than IRL (in real life), because the separation between digital life and physical life has now collapsed. Any persona you have online is real, just like the many personas you have in physical spaces at work or with friends etc. are real, just variations of you. This opportunity in digital spaces to present a new version of yourself has a lot of potential, particularly in gaming. I’ve previously repurposed computer programs like Excel in my work, and I am drawn to artists who hack or mod games like Alice Bucknell with GTA or Cory Arcangel with Super Mario Bros. Game hacking is something I want to look at soon.
After the interview, inspired by my conversation with Ronnie and her immersive subject matter, I revisit the ‘Dataism Confessional’ (2021) to shed some final screen light on her practice.
I must admit to feeling nervous. I have never confessed before.
A pang of anxiety as I see the list of potential sins laid out for me.
At the ‘Datasim Confessional’, I select my respective sins against the almighty Data.
Sloth: not devoting enough time to your devices – my sin is that I don’t share any of my experiences online. Worse, Cookies: blocking access to my personal data – I have blocked all access. Finally, Forgetfulness: being careless with my devices – I often leave my mobile phone in a different room of the house. I submit my sins, looking for salvation.
Luckily my sins are lesser than most, the wave of anxiety has rushed and waned. Absolved now, my screen glowing, my battery depleting, I feel connected. I feel a part of a larger data-driven culture again.
My penance – to share the last 10 photos on my phone online. A little story on the ‘gram may be enough to shake the shame of leaving my phone hidden under the cushion, out of sight, out of mind.
As I leave the confessional I am urged to bask in the glow of my phone, using its screen as a beacon to light my way into the world and the future, sin-free, sharing more data as I go. Perhaps I will repent and take this advice, let my data sit in the purgatory of the databank vaults, cooled by the sea, churning out mindless consumer-driven targeted ads, corrupting itself as it deteriorates. Hopefully, there it can form a glitch, a liminal space that allows endless ownerless identities.
Abi Mitchell is a writer and programmer based in West Yorkshire.
Corridor8 have partnered with Axis on three newly-commissioned pieces of writing, engaging with the work of Axis artists. Similar to Corridor 8, Axis champions and supports contemporary visual arts in the UK. As an organisation, they provide artists with resources, opportunities, and platforms to support and showcase their work. Their aim is to democratise access to contemporary art. To learn more about Axis, or to become a member, please visit www.axisweb.org.
Published 27.06.2024 by Benjamin Barra in Explorations
1,683 words
